BUDDING F1 mechanics are hoping to break their spell of bad luck at an upcoming racing tournament.

 

Students from Glasgow University's mechanical engineering department are putting the finishing touches to their entry for this year's Formula Student contest.

The event, taking place in July at Silverstone racecourse, will see the team's custom made race car battle it out against more than 120 other teams from across the world.

Around 60 young engineers have slaved over their 197kg car since July in the hope it will help them shake off their bad luck from previous contests.

One year the team didn't make it to the race after having problems transporting their car, while another year they did not rank highly.

For this year's contest, some of the team have been working up to 60 hours a week on the project alongside their studies to ensure every detail of the vehicle's design and mechanics are just right.

Team Manager Andrew Reid, 20-year-old second year student said: "The event itself is split into two main areas and panels of judges come round, they work for leading F1 teams and big engineering firms. They judge on us on our design decision and costings. Some of the top teams run up to about £1million per year."

The team are made up of students from across the undergraduate spectrum, with many having little knowledge of the basics.

Andrew said: "We take students from the first year whereas a lot of the other teams at different universities only accept postgraduates only."

"The people who build the car and do all the hands-on work have usually all been doing the programme another year.

"There's also a development team who have not as much knowledge but they're interested.

"They design a car too and take it down to Silverstone and present their design against other teams without actually building anything.

"It doesn't count at all for any of our coursework, everyone does it voluntarily because it's such a great opportunity and experience.

"In terms of an engineering perspective it gives you a different angle.

"We had one guy in the team who had got into the Mercedes F1 team in the aerodynamics department, and 90% of us here want to get into a Formula 1 team and work for them.

"When they go for interview all they talk about is formula student. That's one of the main reasons people do it.

"It's definitely one of the reasons I do it."

Christopher Haslund, the group's sponsorship manager and a first year economics and business student, said: "Arnold Clark are our main sponsors and Hammerman are helping us as well, they help to keep the cars running.

"The university are one of our primary sponsors and give us a lot of help. Externally Arnold Clark help us too.

"Howco have helped to manufacture our uprights and hubs, they do it all for free and in return we put their name on the car.

"To produce four uprights it would be £9,000 and they did it all for free.

"We're really grateful to all the sponsors for their help."

The group will travel to Silverstone on July 9 in the hope of winning the contest.

If they don't succeed, the aim is to keep their existing model and make improvements year on year until they have a winning design.